Livelihood has died, but life is not over

Farm counsellor hopes to help tobacco farmers move forward, not look back

Daniel Pearce
Simcoe Reformer
April 9, 2007

Read this article as it appeared in the Simcoe Reformer (pdf format)

Elaine Froese likens the grief tobacco farmers are feeling, as their industry dwindles to almost nothing, to that of someone who has lost a loved one.

“It’s like someone has got killed by a drunk driver and there’s been no time to say goodbye,” said Froese, a Manitoba farmer who coaches other farmers on how to move on with their lives.

More than that, she said, is the anger they feel at losing financial value in their farms — something they’ll never fully recover even if they do get a government buyout — and the loss of a way of life.

The result is fear, anxiety, and anger. “A lot of farmers feel sideswiped.”

The answer, Froese said, is for farmers to learn to talk — to talk openly with family members and creditors about the end of tobacco — to let go of the past, and to come up with a plan for the future.

Froese, who will be in Delhi on Wednesday as part of a one-day workshop for growers, said making and carrying out that plan is key.

“They have to realize their livelihood has died, but their life is not over,” she said. “They just have to make a shift.

“It’s the art of possibility.”

Area tobacco growers are about to get help in planning the future. A grant from the Community Tobacco Transition Fund to Mike Fidler and Associates of Simcoe will provide free counselling for 125 tobacco families over two years.

Fidler will be in Delhi at the German Home on April 11 along with representatives from provincial and federal agencies who can explain programs available for farmers to help them make a transition.

One of the things farmers have going for them is resilience, Fidler said. “Most have relatives, positions in churches and school boards, that give them a level of respect,” Fidler said. “They’re selfsufficient. They take care of themselves.”

The hard part, he said, will be coming up with answers that don’t involve moving. “There’s not a lot of industry locally, there’s not a lot of jobs,” Fidler said.

The three main choices farmers face, he said, will be to get into a new profession, switch the farm to another commodity, or to start up a business.

Froese said she is familiar with the feeling of loss, having watched $200,000 of her crops be destroyed in a three-minute hailstorm and having gone through severe depression following the birth of a child.

As a coach, she said, she “can help (farmers) discover what the future looks like.”

A workshop for tobacco farmers will be held April 11, 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the German Home in Delhi. Registration is at the door.

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